Stop Texting Your Partner & Pick Up Your Love Life: Dating Lessons

I love texting. I’m a poet of texts. And if you’re a mere mortal, using your thumbs to type, I’m likely to blow up your phone from time to time. But I’m not doing it on purpose. You see, with a Mac I have this cool option to link my phone texts to the iMessage app on my computer. And then I have a full keyboard and my typist skills and poetic bent to light up your phone. I’m sorry, I know I do this. I’m working to get better.

There is ZERO physical touch in texting unless you consider rubbing glass a form of touch. And there is very little potential for nuance. Most sarcasm is misunderstood. Even love notes can be misconstrued easily as hookup offers. And ladies, for the most part, don’t get off on hookup offers. Even established relationships are usually anti-hookup.

And if you ever get in a disagreement. Any kind of disagreement, DO NOT TEXT about it. There is a 0% probability that things will go well. I have never solved a relationship issue over text. Never. And, as I told you, I’m the master of the text.

So what’s the deal with texting anyway?

I have been dating a woman who says, “Just call me,” from time to time when I’m getting particularly clever or long-winded on a text. And she’s made an impression on me. She’s funny. She has great texting skills. And she is also fun to talk to on the phone.

See, for me, most people are NOT fun to talk to on the phone. In my business life, the phone is like the deal killer. If we can do business by email, text, and documents, we can save everybody a lot of time and needless meetings.

But a relationship is not like a business negotiation in one fundamental way. We are looking to connect, physically. And the physical potency of texting is null and void.

Sure there are uses for texts in a relationship. Here are a few of my most potent missives.

“Good morning sunshine.”

“Have sweet dreams.”

“I’m going to be 10 minutes early.”

And there are some flirty options that can be received well. But be careful with the flirty text. Again, it is way to easy for it to be misconstrued.

“You are only interested in sex.”

“Um, no, I was trying to be titillating.”

Fail.

If you want to move your relationship along, stop texting so much. If your partner likes talking on the phone, call them. A phone call is a fairly intimate communication technique, especially compared to dead texting. You can hear the tone in someone’s voice when they respond to your, “What are you doing later tonight?” With a text you have no idea how your message was received.

Get off the phone to really move things forward. Go see them in person. It’s the most intimate form of connection. And when in doubt don’t text. Ever.

As a certified life coach, I’ve been helping men and women find fulfilling relationships. If you’d like to chat for 30-minutes about your post-divorce challenges, I always give the first 30-session away for free. LEARN ABOUT COACHING WITH JOHN. There are no obligations to continue. But I get excited every time I talk to someone new. I can offer new perspectives and experiences from my post-divorce journey. Most of all, I can offer hope.